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Everie Woman in her Humor

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

John P. Cutts*
Affiliation:
Wayne State University
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Extract

Everie Woman in her Humor has received very little critical attention since J. Quincy Adams' study of the play in its relation to The Dumb Knight in 1913. There he stated:

Since Machin's Dumb Knight was written for these Children [the Children of His Majesty's Revels] in 1607-8, since his three eclogues were affixed to Barkstead's Mirrha in 1607, since Every Woman is exactly the type of play acted by the Children, and since it was published in 1609, I am inclined to believe that it dates from about 1607, and that it probably belonged to the repertory of the Whitefriars troupe.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Renaissance Society of America 1965

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References

1Every Woman in Her Humor and The Dumb Knight,’ Modern Philology x.3 (January 1913), 413-432; 424.

2 Bentley, G. E., The Jacobean and Caroline Stage, 5 vols. (Oxford, 1940—56).Google Scholar

3 Ibid., IV, 734.

4 Chambers, E. K., The Elizabethan Stage, 4 vols. (Oxford, 1923), IV, II .Google Scholar

5 Fleay, F. G., A Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, 2 vols. (London, 1891), 11, 321322 Google Scholar (the index reference to p. 258 is incorrect). See Adams, p. 422. It is possible, however, that the song could have been written two or more years before publication.

6 Professor Sabol's researches into music for children's plays have been particularly valuable. See Sabol, A., ‘Two songs with accompaniment for an Elizabethan Choirboy Play,’ Studies in the Renaissance V (1958), 145159 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; ‘A newly discovered contemporary song setting for Jonson's Cynthia's Revels,’ Notes & Queries, n.s., v.9 (September 1958), 384-385; ‘Ravenscroft's “Melismata” and the Children of Paul's,’ RN XII.I (Spring 1959), 3-9; and ‘Two unpublished stage songs for the “Aery of Children,” ‘ RN XII.3 (Autumn i960), 222-231.

7 Songs from the British Drama (Yale University Press, 1925), p. 294. Everie Woman listed as anonymous.

8 The English Dramatic Lyric, 1603-42 (Yale University Press, 1951), pp. 133-134. Everie Woman listed as anonymous.

The ‘snatches’ are not all distinguished in the original 1609 text by the use of italics. Adams, commenting on Bullen's edition of the play in Vol. IV of Old Plays (London, 1885), pointed out that ‘All hayle to my belooued,’ ‘sad dispaire doth driue me hence,’ and ‘And then to Apollo, hollo trees, hollo'—'are the first lines of songs … and should therefore be printed in italics’ (pp. 431, 432).

9 Listed by Reed; not accepted by Bowden. All my textual references to the play are to the Students’ Facsimile Edition (London, 1913).

10 Numbers 8, 9, 11 not listed by Reed.

11 Numbers 10 and 13 not listed by Bowden or Reed.

12 See my ‘A re-consideration of the “Willow Song,” ‘Journal of the American Musicological Society X.I (Spring 1957), 14-24, and ‘Some Jacobean and Caroline Dramatic Lyrics,’ Notes & Queries, n.s., n.3 (March 1955), 106-109.

13 See Fellowes, E. H., English Madrigal Verse 1588-1632 (Oxford, 1920), p. 415 Google Scholar.

14 For general convenience I follow the chronology and attribution of company given by Harbage, A., Annals of English Drama 975-1700 (Pennsylvania University Press, 1940)Google Scholar.

15 Fellowes, p. 15. It is an aubade calling for ‘gowne of green so gay’ to go into ‘the park a maying.’ It is possible to argue that some of Bateson's madrigals were composed as early as 1601. This is certainly true of the first madrigal in the collection—'When Oriana walked to take the air'—which was written for inclusion in Morley's The Triumphes of Oriana, 1601, but arrived too late. However, Bateson's preface addressed to Sir William Norres makes it quite clear that they were written for ‘priuate applause & liking’ and that they were only ‘made’ for Sir William. As ‘Organist of the Cathedral Church of Christ in the Citie of Chester. 1604’ Bateson was remote from London's theatregoers.

16 Fellowes, p. 498.

17 Ibid.

18 Shirley makes one of the very few references to The Dumb Knight in his Example— Queen's, 1634, IV.ii.

19 Fellowes, pp. 410-411.

20 I printed this for the first time in Seventeenth-Century Songs and Lyrics (University of Missouri Press, 1959), p. 154. The pencil annotation I made on my catalog card— ‘Dramatic context?'—has now been realized.

21 Some of these I have printed in Seventeenth-Century Songs and Lyrics. See n. 20. Cf. also my ‘Contributions of Robert Johnson, King's Musician, to Court and Theatrical Entertainments, and the tradition of such service prior to 1642’ (University of Reading, unpublished M.A. thesis, 1953) and Sabol, A., ‘A newly discovered contemporary song setting for Jonson's Cynthia's Revels,’ Notes & Queries, n.s., v.9 (September 1958), 384385 Google Scholar. The setting included in Henry Lawes’ MS (B.M. Loan MS 3 5, fol. 3) is, I think, only Lawes’ adaptation of the earlier setting.

22 Fellowes, pp. 571-572.

23 The Complete Works of Thomas Lodge, 4 vols. (Hunterian Club, 1893), 1, 102-103.

24 Information on the title page.

25 Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 9 vols, and supp. vol. (London, 1954), vi, 769.

26 Adams, pp. 424-425, for ‘Surmises About Machin.'

27 Chambers, III, 434.